There are differences between what some people consider to be a successful writer or author, but in most cases everyone wants to be a professional writer.

Question is: do you have what it takes?

If you ever had the courage to call yourself a writer, you probably saw the amazement and slight disbelief in your conversation partners’ eyes. A writer? Is that something that can actually pay the bills? What are you writing?

Many of us have this image of the writer: a person, who is doing something for a living, but she finds herself regularly typing away in her spare time, and after a considerable amount of time, she shows her writing to other people. And guess what, it turns out to be a best seller! And she has become a millionaire, within the blink of an eye. So finally, she can be a writer, because she now has financial security. She can write whatever she wants, actually.

And there the millions of others, who do the same thing, but fail at producing a best seller at the first try. Why? Well, obviously because they are not talented enough.

This is how we generalize. Simplistic, yes, and of course, could not be further away from the truth.

I have some bad news for some of you: talents actually do matter. If you don’t find writing easy, enjoyable, and if you don’t get positive feedback regularly from people outside your family (professors, editors, random people on the Internet, friends with decent tastes and honest words), chances are you are chasing a profession that is substandard (for you).

But with hard work, you can still get there. Problem is: it is real hard work and does require a certain amount of talent as well. Read more…